Johns Hopkins All Children's offers highly specialized care for infants requiring neonatal surgery, with care often beginning while a baby is still in the womb.

Premature and critically ill newborns may need surgery soon after birth to address defects or abnormalities. Operating on these critical newborns requires a highly specialized level of care.

At Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital in St. Petersburg, Florida, our pediatric surgeons work closely with the perinatologists and neonatologists from the Johns Hopkins All Children's Maternal, Fetal & Neonatal Institute and our pediatric anesthesiologists to provide exceptional neonatal surgery services for newborns with congenital and acquired conditions.

Care That Starts Before Birth

Care often begins before a baby is born. Our pediatric surgeons will meet with expecting families to counsel them about abnormalities that may have been discovered during a prenatal screening or visit. In some instances, steps can be taken to treat babies while they are still in the womb, offering them the best chance for a healthy start.

Why Choose Johns Hopkins All Children’s

As a leader in pediatric surgery, our board-certified pediatric surgeons offer highly specialized care for infants requiring surgery as well as seamless access to specialty services and convenient follow-up care.

Highlights of our program include:

• A comprehensive, team approach to care. Our pediatric surgeons work closely with a host of pediatric subspecialists, including perinatologists, obstetricians, neonatologists, cardiologists, cardiac surgeons, geneticists, neurosurgeons, oncologists, radiologists, and anesthesiologists.
• The Johns Hopkins All Children’s Maternal, Fetal & Neonatal Institute provides high-risk obstetrical and neonatal intensive care. The care is facilitated by a 97-bed Level IV neonatal intensive care unit (NICU), the highest level designated by the Florida Agency for Health Care Administration (AHCA).
• State-of-the-art facilities and resources, including extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO), a special procedure that oxygenates the blood, helping support babies with heart and lung problems for a period of time to allow their organs to recover.
• Regional Network of Care. Our surgeons work with community and regional hospitals throughout Tampa Bay to provide pediatric surgical care to children across the region, including Tampa General Hospital and HCA Florida Brandon Hospital.
• LifeLine, a critical care transport team that includes nurses and respiratory specialists who provide stabilization and support until your child arrives at our hospital to receive specialized care.

Conditions We Treat

Our pediatric surgeons have specialized training and years of experience addressing numerous congenital (present at birth) and acquired conditions. Some of the conditions we treat include:

• Anorectal malformations, a range of birth defects in which the anus (opening through which stool passes) and the rectum (area of the large intestine just above the anus) do not develop properly.
• Annular pancreas, a rare condition characterized by a ring of excess pancreatic tissue that encases and obstructs part of the small intestine.
• Blockages in the intestines, including duodenal and intestinal atresias.
• Biliary atresia (a blockage in the ducts that carry bile from the liver to the gallbladder) and choledochal cysts (which affect the flow of bile from the liver to the small intestine), which are among a group of conditions called hepatobiliary diseases (diseases impacting the bile duct, pancreas or gallbladder).
• Congenital diaphragmatic hernia, a hole in the diaphragm that allows abdominal organs to migrate into the chest.
• Esophageal atresia, a malformation of the esophagus (the tube that connects the mouth to the stomach), which at times has an abnormal connection to the trachea (the tube that allows us to breathe).
• Gastroschisis, a rare defect of the abdominal (belly) wall, in which the intestines protrude outside of the baby's body.
• Hirschsprung’s disease, a condition of the large intestine that causes difficulty with bowel movements.
• Lung lesions and tumors, such as congenital pulmonary airway malformation, which is a result of abnormal lung tissue.
• Necrotizing enterocolitis, a condition that occurs when the lining of the intestinal wall dies, mostly seen in premature or critically ill infants.
• Omphalocele, a birth defect where an infant's intestines or other abdominal organs develop outside of the body, covered by a sac, due to a hole in the navel (belly button) area.
• Sacrococcygeal teratoma, a tumor of the newborn that forms from the tailbone.
• Short bowel syndrome, a condition in which the body cannot absorb enough nutrients because part of the small intestine is not working properly or is missing.

Other Surgical Programs at Johns Hopkins All Children’s

 In addition to our General Surgery Program, Johns Hopkins All Children’s also provides surgical care in other specialized areas. These include:

• Heart surgery
• Neurosurgery
• Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery

You can also learn more about all the programs and services we provide by visiting Our Services.